Providing assistance for older homeless women in San Francisco

Learning to Describe One’s Experience

Describing is something we are taught when we are very young. Once we learn our colors, the idea of basic description falls by the wayside. From that point on, we are taught to evaluate and analyze.

A focus of our client therapy this month has been to re-learn how to describe – to take a situation and describe one’s experience without judging that experience.

This can be helpful for anyone. Describing a situation and one’s experience is especially helpful for our clients at VeraMax House who are faced with difficult experiences every day. It can be a lot easier to analyze a situation after it has passed than to stop and ask oneself what you actually felt.

In working with clients at VeraMax House, I challenge them to just picture the scene and the physical sensations they experience. I ask for specific thoughts and sensations, and not the why. Removing the why, the analysis, can be freeing and can help our clients be more in touch with their feelings and emotions.

Working on therapy with clients is an important aspect of what we do. Empowering them to know themselves better helps provide that stable base they need to succeed.